Heroic Garrosh Defeated
The 10 player Heroic Garrosh encounter has been defeated in Asia by 天 啟. The group had a 573+ item level, compared to the top US and EU guilds that currently have a 565 item level.

Siege of Orgrimmar Heroic ProgressionMethod, Blood Legion, and Exorsus are leading progress with 13/14 bosses down now, followed by five other guilds at 12/14. Over in the 10 player column, Paragon and Depraved are leading with 13/14 bosses down.

Blue Tweets

Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment

Class Balance Discussion
For discussion: How to solve the problem that most class discussions happen in sequestered class forums, which tend to have an echo chamber? (Source)must ask whats good bout discussion? Just lots of opinons?maybe in game sticky so anyone can say what they likehate bout class
Discussions tend to dismantle weak arguments and let stronger ones rise to the top. Discussions are like lists + evolution. (Source)Doesn't stop many common opinions in the community that have been dismantled time and time again.
I agree with that, though I think that's a function of online discussion forums typically having rapid turnover. (Source)

change the format. and both use formats which generate a lot of traction. Forums are becoming antiquated.
Videos take too long to watch (esp with ads). I don't get the appeal. I like Reddit though. (Source)

..and that brings it back to my initial problem. The echo chamber argument is pretty weak....
I agree with Lhivera. The echo chamber effect resists debates and encourages brofisting. (Source)Sounds harsh and elitist, but their progress and experience tells the same story 95% of the time.
But aren't you essentially arguing that the players are usually right? That is by far not the case. They are right... sometimes. (Source)

Arguments for a real problem and for a bogus problem will look very similar in a brofisting context.
Think of it from our POV, where there are always far more demands from players than the game really needs. (Source)
Separating good arguments from bad is non-trivial, so seeing a healthy debate w/ many POVs can help us make that distinction. (Source)

also enforces groupthink around "my class sucks".
And anyone who intrudes to disagree either "doesn't understand our issues" or is accused of trolling. (Source)I'll say it again: You will never get as good feedback as you will get from the class specific forums. Ever.
Not from where I sit. Now it's possible to have healthy debate in class forums, but I rarely see it, and I read a lot of forums. (Source)

I think that would just move the echo chamber somewhere else. Vidcast discussion panels with top players/TCs.
It's interesting that panels and podcasts tend to invite dissenting opinions (w/in reason). (Source)
I think they understand that (softly) competitive structure yields more interesting & informed discussions. (Source)I disagree that it's the format - more the interaction. If there's more from blues I believe you'd see more healthy discussion
The problem is the developers themselves are very busy and can't afford to spend hours per day in forums. (Twitter is fast.) (Source)

Why is the echo chamber a problem? Not trying to be sarcastic; trying to understand what alternate state is desired.
We're not saying there aren't class problems, but when everything is portrayed as a crisis, it's hard to know really needs fixing. (Source)
The echo chamber effect can also cause thought leaders or eloquent posters to create mountains out of molehills. (Source)
It's nice to get a "um your DPS is fine" dissenting opinion, but those "trolls" get chased out of class-specific threads. (Source)you're guilty of this sort over tweets. 'We like where xx is at'. Some weeks later hotfix or minor patch and buffs appear
That is ultimately the system working though. Sometimes players convince us a change is necessary. Other times data prove us wrong. (Source)

Legitimate contributors are discouraged from posting because of toxic abusive posters. Remove problems, contributors return?
I used to subscribe to that more, but over moderation can also create fear and resentment. (Source)
It's also something we can't enforce on websites other than our own, but conversations certainly take place there. (Source)

Bold idea: remove class forums. No echo. "Answers/Advice For New Players" can be its own forum instead.
It's not strictly a "class subforum" problem. Even general forums spawn class-specific threads. (Source)

And to be clear, I do think that blues should always be very careful when they decide to post in a class forum.
I don't personally post in class forums anymore (or rarely anywhere). It caused more QQ than it solved IMO. (Source)
Even today you see Why didn't we get posts / as many posts / as many substantial posts / more posts b/c our issues are worse? (Source)

Reputation / QuestingI should clarify... levelling ONE char was fun. Levelling more in MoP was not.
That's fair criticism. We hoped that choices like Four Winds vs. Krasarang would help the second time around. (Source)

I'm wondering, how do you guys consider MOP levelling? A success, failure / could be better? I find it rather boring.
We think it was probably a little slow overall. At launch, you did a bunch of quests and saw the XP bar grow only a little. (Source)
We buffed the leveling speed a patch or two ago. It feels better now IMO. (Source)

can we get option to show rep gain in quest dialog?
We explored this, but many quests offer rep for multiple factions (like e.g. all Alliance cities) and it was really spammy. (Source)

So you'd rather people get burnt out on gearing, than actually participate because it's fun?
We find most players won't participate in any activity without motivation from rewards that improve power. (Source)
In fact the opposite can also be true: if we're not careful, players will engage in unfun things just for the power rewards. (Source)You mean daily quests?
Or chain running Mechanar. Or farming Sunwell trash. The list goes on. (Source)

I hate to sound like an echo chamber, but dailies feeling required are why I'm not playing Mists.
I think your information might be fairly old. The new patch has virtually no dailies. It still has a lot to do. (Source)

Computers - Setup of the Month (by chaud)
Each month or every 2 months, depending on the hardware evolutions, the lovely chaud will work on a couple of hardware setups for those of you who are thinking of upgrading their computer!

This month
New GPUs from AMD are on the way, so if you are only upgrading your GPU it might be worth it to wait a month or two.

The current SSD prices are stable, with most SSDs under $1 per gigabyte when on sale. RAM prices are continuing to climb.

The Haswell CPUs from Intel are here and they run a little bit on the warmer side. Depending on how much you want to overclock, you may need to spend a bit more for a better CPU cooler like the NH-D14 or H90.

Unless you are doing a lot of video rendering or something that is similarly multithreaded, you do not need the 4770K and should spend that money elsewhere.

Heroes of the Storm Trademark
The Heroes of the Storm trademark from last week appears to have been applied for in the US database now as well. Keep in mind that nothing is confirmed until trademarks are granted.